At BlueHawthorne, we are pleased to offer you a wide selection of quality antiques and collectables from the late 1800's through to the 1940's and 50's. Items in our ever-changing collection are offered online for purchase for both the serious collector and the everyday enthusiast, all at reasonable prices.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

J.H. Weatherby & Sons(Ltd)

The J.H. Weatherby & Sons(Ltd), a family-run company was founded in Tunstall in 1891 and moved to Hanley the following year. Named 'Falcon Pottery', it was the base for their manufacturing and trading of earthenware, and was one of a number of similar potteries in Stoke on-Trent.

1906 saw the addition of a circular bottle kiln, typical of the time but becoming rather rare now.

It first made domestic ware such as printed toilet sets, trinket sets, vases, teapots, tableware and tableware fancies, jugs, fern pots and lidded chamber pots. Soon after World War I, Weatherby began to supply advertising ware tohotels and caterers and later to hospitals and institutions. In the 1920s and 1930s it experimented with modernist matt glazes and introduced Art Deco-style vases, tableware and fancies.

In 1934 it launched Woodpecker Ware tableware, which is highly sought after today, as it its Harvest Time tableware. After World War II the pottery introduced many new lines in giftware and fancies which are now collectable.These include figures and statuettes, toyware, animal models such as Zookies, dwarfs, Toby jugs and offbeat series such as Gonks and Dalek patterns.

During the 1950s, a number of companies began manufacturing ranges of animals, hoping that people would go on to collect several in a set. Wade introduced their exceedingly popular Whimsies - delicate, realistically-modeled porcelain miniature animals and birds - and a company called J. H. Weatherby & Sons Ltd. in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, decided to do the complete opposite, producing a series of sturdy comical animals which they called Zookies. An advertising leaflet from 1957 read, ` People who buy one, buy another and another and buy them for their friends too!'

Unfortunately the high costs of producing pottery in England compared to mass production elsewhere in the world forced the company into receivership.

For more information of the Weatherby Pottery in England,please visit:The Potteries.org